Give us a break is the call from Yorkshire stars

The figure comes from a Professional Cricketers' Association survey in which the nation's professionals say they are overstretched.

This year, counties are playing more cricket than ever with 16 County Championship games, a minimum of 16 Twenty20 matches and a minimum of 12 40-over contests all squeezed into a five-month period.

Patterson, Yorkshire's PCA representative, insists players' views must be taken into account to preserve the quality of the domestic competitions and ensure the long-term success of the England team.

"The consensus among the Yorkshire players is that there is too much cricket and not enough time for preparation and practice and that concern is reflected in the national figures," said Patterson.

"At Yorkshire, we played four Championship matches before the end of May and will have played eight by the end of the month.

"As much as we all love playing and feel very privileged to be playing for a living, the consensus among our lads and the vast majority of professionals is that, to perform at your best in four-day cricket, you need time to prepare and you need rest and recuperation between matches.

"The schedule as it is doesn't really allow for that, and a good schedule is vital to maintain the success and profile of the Test team.

"What needs to happen now is that players' thoughts and opinions must be properly listened to.

"As players, we fill in these surveys every year; we give our feedback but nothing is ever really done about it and the schedule just gets busier and busier.

"It's got to the point now where something's got to happen, and I just hope the ECB take into account the players' views because we're the ones it affects."

One of the biggest problems this year has been the expansion of the Twenty20 Cup, which has effectively taken out the middle of the campaign and forced the Championship to be shoehorned around it.

There is now talk at the ECB of reducing the number of Championship games but the PCA survey also showed strong support for retaining the current system of two divisions and 16 games per county, with most players opting instead for a reduction in one-day fixtures.

"This year, we've got 16 Twenty20 games – and 19 if we happen to get to the final," said Patterson. "Don't get me wrong: Twenty20 is a big money-spinner and produces a lot of revenue for clubs, but I'd be surprised if attendances in the past year or two haven't started to go down. At one point this summer we've got something like four home games in the space of eight or nine days, which is ludicrous.

"We feel it would be better if you had, say, 10 Twenty20 games and 10 40-over games, and then you'd obviously play more if you progressed to the knockout stages.

"As it stands, we've got at least 28 games of limited-overs cricket and the last thing the players want is a reduction in the Championship because that's the competition that prepares you for England."

Yorkshire are currently in one of their busiest periods.

This week they played a four-day game against Somerset at Taunton and tomorrow travel to Southampton in readiness for a four-day match against Hampshire, starting on Monday.

They then have just one day between the scheduled end of that game and the start of the Championship Roses match at Headingley a week today.

Two days after that game, they start their Twenty20 campaign.

"The bottom line is the only people who know how the schedule is are the players," said Patterson. "We're the ones who live it day by day. It's been a long season already. You wouldn't think it was May; we've played so many games it could be June.

"The problem is your star players, the big-name players people come to watch, are going to get injured.

"You're not going to have your best players playing to the best of their ability with the volume of cricket we play."

Yorkshire chief executive Stewart Regan has also warned cricket chiefs to tamper with the county championship "at their peril".

Speaking at the launch of the Yorkshire Cricket Mela, a series of events to celebrate cricket, culture, diversity, community and commerce in the region, Regan made it clear that the county will fight plans to abandon the two-divisional structure, arguing that it performs a vital role in developing Test players.